1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to printed circuit boards, and more particularly to locating a short circuit in a multi-layered circuit board.
2. Background of the Related Art
Modern electronic packages are complex and contain multiple conductive layers, including power and ground layers, where each layer is formed in a different plane between nonconductive layers. Even a minuscule short circuit between two different conductive layers is sufficient to cause a package to fail. The short circuit may occur, for example, because a damaged component like a capacitor has been used during the assembly process. Alternatively, the short circuit may occur where a rework operation resulted in a minute solder splash bridging two voltage traces. A technique such as In-Circuit Test (ICT) can detect the existence of the short circuit, but not its location. A conventional approach for locating the short circuit is to physically depopulate each component between the power and ground planes, one at a time, until the short circuit disappears. However, this can be a very invasive, laborious, and time-consuming process.